


So that's where the story starts for me

by mynameofnames



Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Coming Out
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-20
Updated: 2016-11-20
Packaged: 2018-09-01 01:23:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,615
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8601694
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mynameofnames/pseuds/mynameofnames
Summary: This has been a weird af head cannon of mine that jack comes out in an essay-ish post on Instagram talking about mental health and all that good shit and being a great role model.Also, it's now readable because the amazing aj4668 who edited it for me.





	

 

Last night, Providence Falconers’ forward Jack Zimmermann posted an image to his Instagram of him on the floor having a panic attack just following the Stanley Cup win. 

However, it’s the description that is a must read.

* * *

 

This photo was taken by George, my GM, about 20 minutes after the buzzer of the final. I'm clinging to my boyfriend Eric, who I've been with for the last five years. She didn't know it at the time, but I’m clinging to Eric not out of joy, but because i was having a panic attack. (Don’t get me wrong, winning was amazing. Anxiety just happens sometimes.)

 

I’m showing it to you for a reason: It is time for me to stop hiding and to use my story for what I can do, make some out there feel less alone. So even though I am a very private person, I am going to talk about these parts of me, my sexuality, my mental health, and if we’re going all out, also my history with addiction.

 

Let’s start with this idea of masculinity. There's a line set and if you can't pass it, you're not a good player, regardless of your on-ice talents. It’s intricate and deep and been explained so much better by many other people (thanks, You Can Play) but perhaps best summarized by the use of the word p****y to describe men who don't drop their gloves, and that on ice, “gay” is still an insult.

 

So that’s where the story starts for me - a queer teenager who was mentally ill, who had one goal, but he had to be enough of a man and meeting that criteria felt impossible, so I hid all the things that prevented me from getting there.

 

I was sick. Anxiety was crushing me with a realization that boys were attractive and a legacy of my father’s to live up to. I was sick and I did nothing about it. Because I felt I couldn't get help, I could only be good at hockey and to be good at hockey, I could not be weak.

So what was I, trapped inside an ideal that I didn't need help, I just need to take some pills prescribed by me by a psychiatrist who I never opened up to, and got refills from the pharmacy in whatever new town we were playing in as a part of the Q. Soon it became that I could take one too many, all the way up to five too many, because I needed more. It just wasn't working. I’d be fine denying the damage I was doing. From there, drinking became my second coping mechanism after the pills, even though I was underage. Benzos and alcohol do not mix well, though it helped mask the feelings, and that’s all I thought could help.

 

Then I’d wake up, fight though the hangover and the feeling like I was dying in my chest, to just keep playing, finish practices and crash right down. Aging - it’s a vicious cycle only fueled by this fear of what if I wasn't good at the only thing that I had to have.

 

It got worse and worse, until panicking every day was the norm and I was dependent on drugs and alcohol to get me through life. Freaking out after achievements isn't a new thing. I cried for an hour after scoring the penalty for the Memorial. All I could think was that’s a fluke. I'm expected to live up to that now and never will be able to again.

 

So what happens next? Thirty-four days pass. I wait for the draft, this line of masculinity seeming further to reach than ever. How was I going to fulfill my legacy? How was I going to get there when I was a "fag who cries like a girl and can’t handle anything at all", so I spiraled and spiraled till the draft happened. In a bathroom, already drunk out of my mind, I did what I always did to do to calm me down. I didn't think it was any different. I took out a pill bottle from my pocket and took all that was left, more specifically 600 mg of alprazolam, thirty times the recommended maximum dose, and was found on the floor barely breathing.

 

I woke up under a psych-hold, and tried to convince them I wasn't wanting to kill myself, I just wanted to stop feeling like I couldn't breathe. Why would I try to kill myself to stop me from what I thought was dying? I didn’t know that what it really was just another panic attack.

 

From there, I went into rehab, and I started a long road to recovery, and of course rumors and questions spread like wildfire. What happened with the draft? Was it cocaine? How much cocaine? How long had I been a cocaine addict? Spoiler alert: It wasn't coke. That road was long and perhaps I'm still on it, but I can say one thing. My OD ruined a lot in my life, but it’s what got me the help I needed. So regardless of how many articles that said I was a coke addict, my life got better. I lost everything from someone else's perspective, but to me, I got help and it got better. Know that.

 

I got out of rehab, and I took time off. I nearly relapsed ten times in the first month. I cried. I hated living and I had to learn how to cope with that. I went to therapy twice weekly. I watched a lot of history documentaries, and slowly but surely I was more okay.

 

I was okay enough to get a job. I started coaching an amazing group of twelve-year-olds, some of whom are now in college, and I am so proud of them. Then I was even better, so I took the SATs and I went to college. You might know some of the story from hearing that I played for a small NCAA team. I got a degree and opened my mind to a world of the past I’d never known before and I made life long friends.

 

All though this time, I was still sick. I went to meetings on Fridays and I had panic attack after panic attack. I wasn't magically cured of anxiety. But I was sober, and most importantly overall, despite any shortcomings, I was happy. For so long I had this mantra of "I want to get better", but when I was there I realized that being better is a construct. It gets better, not because your problems go away, but because you learn how to manage them. That means asking for help.

 

What made those years great when I had the same anxiety disorder that had always hurt me before was I had a team to help me. I had a great group of friends who supported me and a couple of professionals to back them up. Those friends were there for me, a guy with a weird nickname who sat with me when I lost my breath, who didn't make me drink at kegsters, and a group of guys right behind me who had my back on the ice and also off. A team to play with and a team to support me. Those teams will always, I hope, be in my life. Perhaps in this time, the most important team member I had was a short, blond, gay, southern boy who loved baking but was still a damn good hockey player. That boy is still in my life and I love him, and he taught me that it was okay for me to love him. Just because I love him does not mean I’m worse of a player.

 

As a final statement I want to say this: I'm bisexual. To you, that may be sensational. You might say i'm full of shit, greedy or confused, or should pick a side, but I don't care. I am in love with a guy and I have loved girls. I know that this isn't going to help me. I know I will be not be accepted the same as if I had omitted this information, and in the end, maybe everyone will call me the first gay player, and my identity will be swept under the carpet, but it needs to be out there.

 

If you don’t like it, then okay, criticize me. I know you will and I can’t stop it. But that won’t change one important thing. This message was never for you. This was for the all the queer kids out there who give up what they love because don’t understand how the world is so cruel. This was for all of the boys and girls and those who fall outside and in-between who are dismissed of their identities because they are young. As one of my friends said when they came out, "But so what if it’s only a phase? If this is a phase, let me live it happily and confident in who I am". Be happy in who you are. It only defines what you want it to define.

 

This story will be picked apart as to whether or not it’s the truth, but if you’re doing that then again, I say my message wasn't for you. You can and you will. But when I tell the story of what it’s like to be mentally ill, I say it for everyone out there struggling who needs these words:

 

If you’re hiding what you're going through, or feel like you won’t make it though, get help. 

  
You will get better, trust me. 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks so much for everyone who read and enjoyed this well it was so grammatically illegible, and for aj4668 for fixing that you should 100% check out their work, it's great.


End file.
